Shadowing Practice: The Buy Nothing Rebellion is Growing... No More CRAP - Learn English Speaking with Video
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In 1955, an economist named Victor Lebeau wrote a sentence that should have terrified everybody who read it.
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He said, our enormously productive economy demands that we make consumption a way of life,
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that we convert buying and use of goods into ritual, that we seek our spiritual satisfaction,
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our ego satisfaction in consumption.
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He's not saying we hope people buy more stuff.
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He said, the economy demands that buying becomes our religion, our identity, and the meaning of our lives.
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That was 70 years ago.
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And here's the thing.
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I know how this sounds like, oh, they plan to turn us all into consumers.
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It's got a little bit of the conspiracy theorist type vibe.
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Except it's like not theory.
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He wrote it.
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There's tons of stuff in this video that I'm going to share with you that is like, they literally told us what they were going to do and we still fell for it somehow.
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Like this was basically a memo to the industry.
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And it's not like they were just predicting what would happen in the future they actually built this.
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And it worked so well that now people who opt out of the system, who opt out of this, are called weird.
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They're the exceptions.
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When did this happen?
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When did becoming normal become such a weird thing to do?
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Like think about the things that used to just be life, like cooking dinner at home most nights, driving a car until it actually dies, having a closet with maybe like one nice jacket in it,
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one income supporting the family, fixing things yourself instead of replacing them.
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None of that used to be like a lifestyle choice.
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It didn't used to have a name.
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It used to be called Tuesday.
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Now, if you cook most of your meals at home, people act like you discovered something unique and different.
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Like, oh, you have an amazing skill of cooking, feeding yourself.
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If you drive a 15-year-old car that has 150,000 miles on it, but it still works perfectly fine, you're now behind in life.
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It's like, oh, when are you going to upgrade?
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You must not be doing well.
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It's to the point where if you don't buy new clothes all the time
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and you just wear the same thing and you just find a few clothes
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that you like and wear them all the time, people now associate.
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It's like a whole personality now.
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It's even a hashtag.
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Like millions of people are now opting out of overconsumption.
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And the most watched corner of it on TikTok is literally called underconsumption core.
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Interest on that subject has jumped over 4,000% in a single year.
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People are realizing that we have become the product and they're opting out.
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And this whole underconsumption core, what is it really?
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It's using stuff you already own.
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It's wearing the same thing multiple winters in a row.
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It's keeping your old phone because it still works.
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The New York Times described it as romanticizing buying and using only what you need.
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And I'm quoting here, being normal is now trending.
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And I feel like that's the whole thing in like five words.
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We have wandered so far from baseline that returning to the baseline feels like a rebellion.
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Like just being healthy feels like you're being extreme.
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Enough is a radical idea for most people.
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I know it wasn't an accident.
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I think we were warned and we just walked into it anyways.
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And a lot of this I'm about to share is kind of disturbing.
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If I told you that a group of people sat down
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and planned to turn society into a bunch of consumers to
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make us need to buy things in order to feel fulfilled or happy, roll your eyes or at least think it's a bit of a conspiracy.
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But that LeBeau memo that I read you at the beginning, that was not the only one.
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There's actually a lot on this.
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So here's what most people don't know.
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The idea of a consumer, a person whose main job in the economy is to keep buying, that's not ancient.
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For most of history, the smart move was the opposite.
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Frigality and thrift weren't quirky.
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They were just like normal survival.
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It was how you lived.
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You made things last because making them last was how you like literally stayed alive.
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And then roughly a hundred years ago, businesses ran into a problem.
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Factories got so good that they were producing more than people actually needed.
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So since like not growing was not an option for them, the question then became how do we get people to want
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and need and consume more of our stuff so we can just make more money?
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Well, enter Edward Bernays.
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He was the nephew of Sigmund Freud, and he kind of figured it out.
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In his 1928 book, he wrote that mass production is only profitable if it keeps selling.
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Supply must actively seek to create its corresponding demand.
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He said companies can't afford to wait until the public asks.
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They have to plant the seed of desire first.
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He didn't sell people products.
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He sold them feelings.
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He sold them freedom, status, identity.
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And then he just attached a product to that feeling.
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He even once got a generation of women to start smoking by calling cigarettes torches of freedom.
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So that they could, you know, destroy roughly twice as many people's lives.
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That's how powerful this stuff is.
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And the part that gets me is like people have been warning us about this very loudly the entire time.
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It's been like slowly going downhill.
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In 1957, a journalist named Vance Packard wrote a book called The Hidden Persuaders.
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It became a national sensation and he exposed how advertisers had started using psychology,
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actually Freudian psychology, to dig into people's unconscious fears and desires and use them to sell.
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He laid out eight emotional needs that they target.
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Security, reassurance of your own worth, ego, a sense of power, a sense of immortality.
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And they figured out that if a product promises one of those, people will feel compelled to buy it.
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And the wildest example of all, I think, is a researcher named Ernest Ditchard.
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Like, you will not believe this.
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In the 50s, companies could not get housewives to buy instant cake mix.
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So Ditcher ran a focus group with women and figured out that they felt guilty.
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They felt like they were cheating by just using the cake mix out of a box, right?
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Like they weren't providing for their families.
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And so to change this, he just changed the recipe so that you had to add like a real egg to the mix.
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So you had to like do something a little bit.
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That one egg made it feel like genuine effort, made you feel like you accomplished something.
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Again, going back to a feeling, an instant cake mix is just like totally took off by making you do more work.
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Like that's how deep this is like cake mix.
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They're making it so you don't feel guilty about getting instant cake mix.
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That's one example out of hundreds of thousands.
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So when you feel that pull, that sense that what you have isn't enough, that everyone else is upgrading, you're falling behind.
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This feeling isn't random.
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It's not a personal flaw.
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It's the product.
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It's the thing that they spent a hundred years
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and a trillion dollars a year learning how to manufacture inside of your head.
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And this new normal that they've sold us, it's expensive.
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And not just in money, although yeah, like money too.
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If we look at like literally the simplest thing in the world, eating.
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Cooking a basic dinner at home runs you roughly like four to seven dollars per person.
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That same meal at takeout or a combo is going to run you 10, 15, 20 dollars.
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And if you're going a step further and you're having something delivered, it can be about five times more expensive than making that same thing at home.
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And we're not talking about a rare treat.
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We're reorganizing our entire lives around not cooking,
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around convenience, around the idea that your time is way too valuable to spend 20 minutes making food.
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So instead, you work extra hours, you pay somebody else, plus the delivery fee, plus a service fee, plus a tip, just have a meal and you'll be hungry again in four or five hours.
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And it's the same story with everything.
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Your closet's probably full and yet you feel like you have nothing to wear.
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The car payment just never ends.
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As soon as you pay it off, you feel this need to upgrade to a There's the subscriptions you thought you had.
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The average person spends over $200 a month on subscriptions, but they think that they spend only 80.
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Because of this new normal, we are bleeding money in so many ways and we've just become desensitized to it.
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Before I get to how this is actually affecting life choices for most people, all the way down to how many kids they have,
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I wanna talk about a bill that most people just don't question and that is their phone bill.
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Like 60, 80, $100 a month for most people is just like a line item that they never consider.
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Shows up, you pay, you don't think about it.
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I used to do that.
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And that's one of the reasons I've actually partnered with Telo Mobile as the sponsor of this video.
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TeleMobile starts at just $5 a month and goes up to $25 a month for unlimited.
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And it's on America's largest 5G network.
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And there's none of these traps that all the big companies that you see all the ads for have.
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There's no two-year lock-ins.
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There's no contracts.
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If you wanna change your plan next month, you can just change it.
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Like, novel idea.
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And again, America's largest 5G network.
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It's not like you're getting a potato to hold up to your, like, it just works, but it's way cheaper and you can start at just five bucks a month.
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You can build your own plan.
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You can pick how many minutes you want.
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Text, your data, and only pay for what you use.
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Hotspots are free.
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Wi-Fi call-in is free.
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International calls to 60 plus countries are included.
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I feel like it's a phone plan that is equivalent to cooking dinner at home.
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Like it's not like fancy, but it saves you a bunch of money and it's just as good if not better.
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Like what are we doing here?
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Like wireless that doesn't drive you crazy?
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Tello me about it.
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They have 4.5 stars with 14,000 reviews.
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You can build your own plan at tello.com.
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There's a link down in the description.
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Thank you to Tello for sponsoring this video.
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It's literally a no-brainer.
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Here's where things get heavier because it isn't just about our stuff.
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The cost of being normal has crept into the biggest decisions of our lives.
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I've talked to people all the time to want to have, you know, maybe a parent to be home with their kid, be able to spend more time with them.
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Or maybe they have one or two kids and they want another one, but they're quietly deciding that they can't purely because of money,
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because the new normal lifestyle costs so much now that even with two people working, they feel like they can barely cover it.
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And the idea of one person staying at home with the kids sounds impossible to most people.
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But throughout most of history, this was the case.
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One person would go out and work, the other person would be home, raising the kids, cooking, doing all that stuff.
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The more like traditional lifestyle throughout most of history.
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And one reason that was possible is because they needed less.
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The house was significantly smaller.
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If you look at the average square footage of houses 100 years ago, to the average square footage now.
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Yes, prices are way more expensive now, but it's also because the square footage is also way bigger.
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We feel like we need that giant house to be somebody, right?
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Dinners were all made at home.
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There weren't multiple hundreds of dollars a month in subscriptions.
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There weren't new products always launching that you just had to buy.
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And I'm not telling anybody how to live here.
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Like if both partners want to work, that's awesome.
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If you love your job and you just want to work 80 hours a week or 60 hours a week, like go for it, do your thing.
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But I think it's important to ask ourselves, Is this really what we want?
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Are we being tricked into this new lifestyle?
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Did someone choose it for us long ago and never tell us that there was another option?
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Because this is what everybody around us is doing.
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And real quick, before we get to the really juicy stuff, if you're getting some value out of this and you want to help kind of this buy nothing rebellion, feel free to drop a like or drop a comment.
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It really makes a significant impact on how the video does.
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So thank you.
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Right now, something is changing.
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And it's the same thing we saw in the last video.
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It's just bigger than I kind of first realized.
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The buy nothing rebellion was never really about buying nothing.
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I feel like that was just kind of the surface.
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But underneath, people are reaching for something that is much older.
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They're trying to like take back normal without being judged for it.
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And it's funny that people are calling this radical now, like cooking most of your meals at home, living below your means on purpose, not because you have to, but because it buys you freedom,
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driving a paid off car with a scratch on the bumper and feeling zero shame about it.
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Having a small wardrobe of things that you actually wear.
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One parent at home with the kids.
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Wanting a big family and chickens and to make sourdough bread and to live a simple, quiet life and community that doesn't cost a lot, that isn't flashy.
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None of that is extreme.
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That is normal.
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It's the old normal before they corrupted it.
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But I think a lot of the reason why this has become like a movement
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or a trend feels rebellious is
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because they literally spent the last hundred years convincing us
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that the only way to get happiness the only way to
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get fulfillment the only way to enjoy our lives is by
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possessions by things by status by your job title by the car you have the house you drive the clothes
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that you wear
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when in reality this old normal of having freedom of having
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clarity of having enough without having excess for most people is way more fulfilling
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and the people doing this they're not all extreme minimalists or budgeting fanatics.
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They're young couples like me, realizing that, you know what?
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My wife doesn't have to work.
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She can stay home with our three kids.
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We just don't spend a lot of money.
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We just don't buy stuff.
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We even had, like for a while, we had one car that we shared.
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We almost never bought things.
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We had zero debt.
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And when you live that type of lifestyle, you need far less money to survive.
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And therefore, we can live on one income and still have kids and feed ourselves.
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But it's not just me.
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This is happening everywhere.
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People are making small changes.
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They are consuming less, they're cooking at home and paying off thousands in consumer debt.
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It's families deciding that, you know what?
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I want more time with my loved ones.
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I want more time with my family more than I want an expensive vacation, more than I want a bigger house, because generally the bigger the house, less time I actually have to enjoy it.
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They're not depriving themselves.
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They're realizing that deprivation was that other life, the one that you're working constantly to afford things you don't need to impress people you don't even care about.
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And there's one line that I just keep coming back to.
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70 years ago, an economist said that the economy needs us to find a spiritual satisfaction in buying things,
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to like make consumerism the meaning of our lives.
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But the problem is once you take that far enough, you realize that that is not it.
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There's been so many people who have made it to the top, who bought everything there is to buy, and they realize this is not it.
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I can find purpose, satisfaction, and enjoyment in slow living, and walks outside in the woods and raising chickens so that I can have eggs and be my family,
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cooking outside and having a smaller home, not actually like going to stores, in just making your own clothes and taking care of yourself, in doing things with your hands,
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in a closet that's small, but a life that is full.
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It's crazy how they turned you into a consumer and then they told you that consuming, that is freedom.
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Being able to buy whatever you want and own a bunch of stuff, that's what freedom is.
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But it's not.
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It's a trap.
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It's chains.
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It's why you stay at the job that you hate.
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It's why you can't have more kids.
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It's why maybe your partner can't stay home or you can't travel as much as you want to.
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It's because of that freedom.
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So I just want to say that being normal isn't weird.
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Wanting less stuff, like being a minimalist, it's not extreme.
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Cooking your own dinners, driving a car into the ground, choosing time over stuff, this shouldn't be a trend.
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This should just be like how normal people function.
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And I feel like the most rebellious thing
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that we can do right now is just like not be apologetic for wanting to be normal
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and living a normal lifestyle that doesn't revolve around consumerism.
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If this hit home for you, I made a video called the Buy Nothing Rebellion, talking about more of the psychology of ads and how they tricked us into this.
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So if you're interested, you can check that out right here.
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If you enjoyed this video, again, feel free to interact with it in any way.
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Drop a like, subscribe, really does help out the videos.
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I'm also going to be doing a follow up to this in my newsletter.
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There is a link down below.
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I break down more examples and some habits I'm personally doing to escape them.
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And thank you for watching.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This B2 speaking lesson is built on the video “The Buy Nothing Rebellion is Growing... No More CRAP”. This video has 257 sentences and 3137 words to shadow. The speech runs for 15:00. The speaker talks fast, about 209 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 87% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is easy to follow.
Key vocabulary in this video
The 15 most advanced words in the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| rebellion noun | /ɹɪˈbɛl.i.ən/ | Armed resistance to an established government or ruler. |
| satisfaction noun | /sætɪsˈfækʃən/ | A fulfilment of a need or desire. |
| consume verb | /kənˈsum/ | To use up. |
| subscription noun | /səbˈskɹɪpʃən/ | Access to a resource for a period of time, generally for payment. |
| consumerism noun | /kənˈsumərɪzm̩/ | A materialistic attachment to possessions with a heavy use of consumables; a lifestyle based on such tendencies. |
| minimalist adjective | /ˈmɪn.ə.məl.ɪst/ | Believing in or seeking a minimal state; seeking to minimize or reduce to a minimum. |
| rebellious adjective | /ɹəˈbɛliəs/ | Showing rebellion. |
| underconsumption noun | Insufficient consumption (for financial stability). | |
| baseline noun | /ˈbeɪslaɪn/ | A line that is a base for measurement or for construction. |
| memo noun | /ˈmɛməʊ̯/ | A short note; a memorandum. |
| fulfill verb | /fʊlˈfɪl/ | To satisfy, carry out, bring to completion (an obligation, a requirement, etc.). |
| economist noun | /iˈkɑ.nə.mɪst/ | An expert in economics, especially one who studies economic data and extracts higher-level information or proposes theories. |
| opt verb | /ɑpt/ | To choose; select. |
| sponsor noun | /ˈspɒn.səː/ | A person or organization with some sort of responsibility for another person or organization, especially where the responsibility has a religious, legal, or… |
| closet noun | /ˈklɑzɪt/ | A small room within a house used to store clothing, food, or other household supplies. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| figure out verb | To come to understand; to discover or find a solution; to deduce. |
| pay off verb | To bribe, especially to deter oversight. |
| break down verb | To stop functioning. |
| fall behind verb | To be late (for a regular event) |
| go back to verb | To stem from; to originate in. |
| go out verb | To leave, especially a building. |
| help out verb | To provide assistance. |
| hold up to verb | To physically lift another person to the same height as something. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- He's not saying we hope people buy more stuff.
- It's like, oh, when are you going to upgrade?
- Are we being tricked into this new lifestyle?
- They're young couples like me, realizing that, you know what?
- It's families deciding that, you know what?
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| “Used to” used to + verb — a past habit or state that is no longer true | used to just be · used to be · used to have |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | has jumped · have become · have wandered |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | are called · be called · were warned |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | people who opt · people who have |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 65 contractions and reduced forms, such as they're, don't, you're. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: theorist /ˈθiːəɹəst/, thrift /ˈθɹɪft/, underneath /ˌʌndɚˈniθ/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: satisfaction /sætɪsˈfækʃən/, subscription /səbˈskɹɪpʃən/, deprivation /ˌdɛp.ɹɪˈveɪʃən/, flashy /ˈflæʃi/, hashtag /ˈhæʃˌtæɡ/
- Long words — get the stress right: rebellion /ɹɪˈbɛl.i.ən/, satisfaction /sætɪsˈfækʃən/, consumerism /kənˈsumərɪzm̩/, minimalist /ˈmɪn.ə.məl.ɪst/, economist /iˈkɑ.nə.mɪst/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like rebellion, satisfaction, consume.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.